


Air, Earth, Water, Fire, and Steel

by Strudol



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Bending, Gen, bison, sword - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-09
Updated: 2017-08-02
Packaged: 2018-02-12 12:17:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2109639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Strudol/pseuds/Strudol
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zuko manages to capture the Gaang during his visit to the Southern Water Tribe, will they be able to escape the fire Nation capitol with the help of an unlikely ally? (OC)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This features a character of my own creation. please leave a comment and let me know what you think of the story!

Air, Earth, Water, Fire, and Steel

 

“Wake up!” a loud bossy voice said from behind the door, followed by a sharp knocking.

“I said wake up!”  The door burst open and light streamed into the room illuminating the bed’s single occupant.

            “Gah!” Shio exclaimed, shielding his eyes with the pillow, “You know my eyes are super sensitive Azula, shut the damn door!”

            Azula shut the door but didn’t apologize, “My father has called an emergency meeting of the court and I need my bodyguard with me.”

            He grumbled sleepily, “Haven’t you told your father that you don’t need a body guard?”

            “Multiple times,” she replied, “but he insists that it is proper for a princess to have one even though she can easily defend herself.”

            He grunted in reply, throwing the covers off the bed and reaching for his protective sunglasses, “Give me ten minutes to get dressed.” He said.

            Without a word Azula left the room. Shio quickly bathed and dressed in a pair of loose fitting black pants, a tight, sleeveless black shirt and his jacket. The jacket was sleeveless like the shirt exposing lightly muscled arms; the red, black and yellow coat has been custom made for him by one of the finest garment makers in the fire nation, a gift from the princess for his birthday. He belted on two short swords around the small of his back; the hilts protruding  on either side of his back and donned a large broadsword, the hilt sticking over his right shoulder. He opened the door where Azula was waiting for him and they departed for the throne room.

            “So what is so important that we have to be in the throne room at this time in the morning? The suns barely up.”

            “No idea,” Azula replied, a courier just came and got me, I know just as much as you do.”

            They continued the rest of their walk to the throne room in silence. As they approached the entrance to the throne room, Azula changed her gait from her usual aggressive stride to a more delicate walk befitting of a royal princess. Shio too changed his gait, squared his shoulder and did his best to make himself look taller, and more intimidating as a bodyguard should.

            “Princess Azula and her escort Shio.” the crier shouted as they entered.

            “I really wish they would give me a different title,” Shio muttered to Azula as they crossed the floor, “makes it sound like we’re screw… uh, romantically involved” he said catching himself, it wouldn’t look very good if someone overheard him using that kind of language in front of the nobles.

            Azula snickered and rolled her eyes, implying wordlessly that the thought of the two of them ever being romantically involved was silly.

            Azula approached the curtain of fire that her father sat behind, she bowed, “Father.”

            Azula stepped aside, heading for her place beside her father, Shio approached the fire and bowed in an identical fashion, “Firelord.” He turned and followed Azula to her seat and was about to take his place standing directly behind her when the firelord spoke, “Shio, come here.” One of Shio’s eyebrows shot up in surprise but he strode over.

Ozai motioned for him to kneel beside him, which Shio did; Ozai then leaned over and whispered something in his ear.

            From her seat, even though she couldn’t see his eyes behind his dark glasses she could tell that Shio was shocked at what her father was telling him. She began to seethe a little with envy as she wondered what made Shio privy to this information and not her.

            Ozai finished his instructions to the swordsman, “Now go,” he said dismissing Shio, “There is transportation waiting outside the palace gates.”

            “Y-yes, Firelord, right away.”  Shio replied standing up and bowing quickly. He stepped to the massive flame curtain which parted in front of him. He was so shocked at the news that Ozai had told him, he forgot to adopt his intimidating stride as he left the throne room. He got into the horse drawn carriage at the front of the palace which started immediately for the docks. _Could Prince Zuko really have the avatar?_ He wondered staring out the window of the carriage at the bright sunny day.

Several minutes later the carriage arrived at the main harbor; Shio got out and began walking down the docks, passing the massive Fire navy ships that dwarfed anything the other two nations had. Soon Prince Zuko’s ship came into sight; it was quite easy to spot as it was just a small clipper that was miniscule next to the massive Battleships docked next to it. He arrived just as the gangplank of the ship was being let down, Shio stopped at the bottom of the ramp his read coat blowing in the stiff ocean breeze. Prince Zuko emerged within moments and immediately spotted Shio standing at the bottom; he gestured to someone inside and made his way halfway down the ramp where he stopped.

            “What are you doing here?” Zuko asked sneering at the swordsman, “Are you my welcome party?”

            “You could say that,” Shio replied shrugging, “I’m here bearing a message from your father

            “Oh? Well let’s hear it.”

            “He essentially says that if you have come back without the avatar or with a fake one you will not be leaving this island again.”

            “So he has decided to take me back no matter what?” Zuko asked, his hopes clearly rising.

            “No,” Shio replied, smirking slightly, “He implied that the consequences of a fake or nonexistent avatar would be much more severe than the punishment you received last time.” Shio noticed Zuko’s hand reach up for the scar on his left eye but quickly stopped himself. “So you would technically be living here, but you would be living here six feet underground…”

            Zuko frowned but did not seem too worried, “If that’s all then you can get away from my ship and let us unload.” Zuko snapped, expressing his intense dislike for the swordsman.

            Frowning, Shio snapped right back, “Oh, drop the attitude Zuko, you’re damn lucky that your father didn’t have you blown out of the water as soon as you entered the harbor.”

            “Respect your superiors,” he said condescendingly, “You will address me as Prince Zuko.”          

“I don’t have to address you as CRAP, as far as everyone on this island is concerned, you’re still banished and have no title or birthright.”

Zuko couldn’t argue with that so he kept his mouth shut and glared fiercely at the older boy.

“Anyway,” Shio continued, “The Firelord has ordered you to come to the palace immediately so you can present your captives, if you have any, directly to him. There will be transportation waiting for you at the end of the dock. NOW I’m finished, I’ll see you at the palace.”

 Without another look back Shio turned and strode back up the docks and to his carriage. He was still angry at Zuko for such a cocky little jerk but by the time he got back to the palace he had cooled down. He strode into the throne room, waving off the crier who had been about to announce his name again. As he approached Azula she raised an eyebrow, wordlessly asking what that was all about. Shio shook his head and mouthed _You’ll see_ to her. The curtain of fire parted in front of him and he took his place behind Azula, his feet shoulder width apart and his hands clasped behind his back.    

They only had to wait for a few minutes until the crier opened the massive doors to the throne room and shouted, “The Great General Iroh and his nephew Zuko!”

The entire throne room gasped in surprise and whispered quietly to themselves as the generously proportioned former general and the scrawny, scarred teenager stepped through into the throne room. Zuko strode in confidently, seeming quite sure of himself while Iroh seemed incredibly uneasy. They stopped in front of the throne and bowed to the Firelord. Shio saw a jolt run through Azula as she realized who had just walked in; it quickly subsided and she quickly regained his composure.  

The silhouette that was the Firelord leaned forward slightly, “I was certainly surprised when I was informed that you were about to dock in the harbor, I can only assume you have a good reason to return,” the Firelord.

“I do Father,” Zuko replied loudly, making sure he was head by the entire court, “I have captured the Avatar…”

This time the court erupted into all out chatter, not even trying to whisper anymore.

Zuko gestured and two of his guards hauled three figures into the throne room.  They forced the trio down to their knees. Peering over the curtain of fire Shio was surprised to see that they were but children. The one in the center was a boy, maybe 11-13, Shio couldn’t be sure, he was dressed in yellow and orange clothing and had obvious blue tattoos on his bald head. The two kids on either side of him    were dressed in blue clothing, what Shio assumed to be watertribe garb. The looked around nervously too scared to say anything, the boy with the tattoos however had a muzzle of some kind over his mouth. Shio was rather skeptical of this, as the Avatar would have been well over 100 years old at this point.

Ozai seemed to be thinking the same thing as he stiffened, “Then WHY,” the firelord thundered, “have you brought me a Bunch of children!?”

Zuko cringed and recoiled slightly as the curtain of fire blazed higher under his father’s anger. Shio saw him quickly compose himself, a look of determination on his face. “Father, this child is the Avatar,” he said gesturing at the one in orange; He hauled him up by the arm and marched him closer to his father’s throne. “If you’ll look closely father you can tell that the boy’s tattoos are authentic as far as we can tell from the illustrations in historical texts.” Shio could see the boy’s tattoos much easier now that he was closer, they appeared to be very intricate lines all meshed together to form an arrow on his forehead and continued down his neck and disappeared under his clothes. “We also discovered this,” Zuko continued, presenting his father with a wooden staff. A servant came forward and took the staff, handing it to the firelord who began inspecting it. “As you can see, father, it is a glider that the airbenders used.” The firelord  nodded, seemingly convinced of the fact that the boy was indeed an Airbender.

“What of the other two? Why have you brought them before me? Asked Ozai, sounding much less angry than he did before.

“They attempted to rescue the avatar after we were underway. They attacked us with his flying bison

            “How do we know he’s the avatar?” Inquired Azula, Shio could detect a small hint of anger in her voice, “How do we know that he isn’t the child of some airbenders that managed to escape the purge?”

            “Azula makes an excellent point Zuko, what proof do you have that this is the Avatar?

            Iroh spoke up, “We were sailing near the northern water tribe and spotted a large beam of energy and immediately sailed towards it.” Iroh looked down, seemingly ashamed of the next part, “When we arrived, we found the boy and forced him to come with us by threatening to raze the village to the ground. Then we performed the avatar test; we already knew he was an Airbender from the short fight he put up. We placed the other three elements in front of him and all three of them reacted to his presence. We are sure he is the-”

            “Show me.” Interrupted Ozai, “Show me the test.”

            Iroh nodded and gestured to the guards; the one holding Aang shoved him forward and brought him back to his knees closer to the Firelord, the other brought a bag out and first placed a candle in front of the bound and gagged boy and lit it. the flame seemed to flare and be slightly drawn to the boy.

Shio raised an eyebrow and shook his head slightly; any reasonably skilled firebender could do that.

Next, the guard took out a water skin and poured haphazardly around the boy scattering the water everywhere. The droplets now seemed to move slightly on their own eventually coalescing into a perfect circle in front of the boy.

Shio was impressed, if this was a trick he couldn’t figure out how they could pull that off without warping the floor itself.

Finally, the guard pulled out a rock with a pointy end on it. To demonstrate, he walked closer to the firelord and placed it on the pointy end where it promptly fell over. The guard brought the rock back and placed it the exact same way in front of the boy where it balanced perfectly and stayed there.

Shio heard Ozai exhale loudly and the curtain of fire flared in front of him. Ozai stood and walked through the flames, passed through them and began to approach Zuko, whose eyes widened with poorly suppressed fear.  Ozai strode right up to him and put ha hand on his shoulder.

“My son, you have redeemed yourself.” He said a smile slowly spreading across his face. “As of right now, your honor and title have been restored,” He turend to the rest of the throne room and proclaimed loudly “The Crown Prince has returned!” the throne room erupted into applause.

Shio applauded as well, he glanced down at Azula, who was barely clapping at all. He could see her frowning, her anger barely contained. This was only compounded as Zuko approached the two of them; he saw Azula’s back stiffen.

“Hello Azula, nice to see you again.” The prince said smirking slightly.

Azula’s voice was neutral but Shio could tell she was hiding anger behind it, “Nice to see you too, brother.”

Zuko then leveled his gaze at Shio and cleared his throat pointedly.

Shio rolled his eyes behind his glasses. “Welcome back, Prince Zuko.”

Zuko gave him a cocky grin; he opened his mouth to say something else but at that moment Ozai clapped his hands. The throne room instantly fell silent and all attention was focused on the firelord.

“First, take the prisoners away and lock them up in the main prison. Then interrogate them, find out if they know about those pesky water tribe boats that have been harassing our supply lines.”

A trio of royal guards crisply saluted and roughly dragged the children off. Shio winced in sympathy as the watertribe boy’s head was knocked against the ground.

            “Second,” continued Ozai, “begin preparations for a feast! The Crown prince has returned and a celebration in in order!”

The throne room erupted in applause, and Zuko smugly looked around, glad to be back in his rightful place.

            Shio politely applauded, but the nagging thought that this event would change the royal family forever permeated his mind.

 


	2. The Prisoners

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Gaang are subject to the torturing prowess of princess Azula. Shio meets the prisoners for the first time.

AEWFS Ch. 2: The Prisoners

            With the announcement of the banquet, the Court was dismissed. As the rest of the group got up to leave Shio and Azula went to step down from the platform.

            Azula stopped, as if an idea had suddenly occurred to her, “Wait here,” she ordered Shio.

She approached her father and spoke for a few moments, Ozai thought, stroking his goatee for a moment, then nodded and said a few words. Azula stood, a smug grin spreading across her face.  
            She returned to Shio and they began to leave the throne room. “What was that all about?” Shio asked.

            “My father has given me permission to interrogate the prisoners for the next few days…” she let the sentence trail off.

            “That’s nice,” Shio said raising an eyebrow, “I guess,” He felt bad for the kids, they already would have had a hard enough time dealing with the normal interrogators that Ozai employed but now they had to deal with the borderline psychotic princess.

            “Yes, yes it is.” As they left the throne room Azula’s mood quickly darkened. As soon as they got out of eye and earshot of anybody important, Shio dropped the strut he had adopted and walked beside the princess with a more casual gait; Azula dropped her short, graceful stride and dropped into her natural aggressive stride as she seemed to get angrier and angrier as they continued down the hallway.

            “What’s wrong?” asked Shio, glancing at her through the tint of his glasses, raising an eyebrow.

            “That little bastard wasn’t supposed to come back…” she hissed through gritted teeth, “I was supposed to be the one to sit on the throne, not him. That sniveling little…”

            Shio rolled his eyes, thankful she couldn’t see them thanks to his glasses, and tuned her out as she ranted about how underserving of the throne her brother was. He sighed internally, in his opinion; Azula had always been too ambitious for her own good. She would do just about anything to make sure her father favored her, even leading small military campaigns in the earth kingdom. And she always dragged him along; he had seen her order entire villages burned to the ground just to find a few rebels. He genuinely hated going on these military campaigns, not only did he dislike destroying the lives and homes of civilians but he knew that it was the only reason she kept him around. Azula was an extremely skilled hand to hand combatant, but she knew almost nothing about military strategy and how to manipulate the natural environment to her advantage. Shio, was very skilled in the use of large number of troops; however, while he was well above average in his hand to hand skills, he had no doubt in his mind she could beat him if it came down to a fight.

            Azula finished her rant and they continued walking in relative silence.  Azula parted company with him at his quarters.

            “Make sure you’re ready in time to escort me to the banquet this afternoon.” She snapped.

            “Yes ma’am.” he said somewhat sarcastically, but if she picked up on it she gave no reply and continued walking down the hallway.

            He spent the next two hours getting caught up on the sleep he had lost that morning and then spent the next hour after that getting dressed for the feast. He really wished that he didn’t have to go to these stupid feasts, he had much more important things to do, like training more palace guards He donned a fancier version of his normal jacket, it had essentially the same color scheme and had sleeves that actually covered his arms. He strapped his broadsword onto his back, he took it wherever he went, but left his two short swords back in his room.

            Azula arrived at his room right on time and he escorted her to the dinner. The dinner was almost entirely uneventful. Zuko was basking in the fame and glory that was being directed his way by just about everyone. Azula eventually couldn’t stand it any longer and excused herself as soon as it was polite to do so. Azula gave no indication that Shio should follow, so he stayed for a little while longer and enjoyed his meal and drink. He had a seat close to the firelord as he was the princesses ‘bodyguard’ and everyone around him was discussing military and political matters; Shio kept his mouth shut for the most part, as his opinions on these matters would not have been taken to very kindly in the presence of such powerful men. Eventually he excused himself, changed his outfit once again and spent the rest of the night drilling himself on various sword techniques and forms.

            The next morning at breakfast, Azula practically entered the room with a bounce in her step. She looked both happy and eager and left the palace as soon as she was done eating no doubt off to torture the avatar and his friends. Shio spent a good portion of the day drilling some new, non-bending security force recruits on their sword techniques. He didn’t see Azula again until dinner where she looked extremely pleased with herself. The same thing happened the next day: she disappeared early and didn’t come back till late. Although this time she looked markedly less happy than the day before.

            The next day at breakfast, after she was done eating Azula ordered Shio to accompany her to the prison that the children were being held at.

            “What?” he asked taken aback, “Why?”

            “Because I can’t break them,” she replied, sounding incredibly frustrated, “I need you to do it, your work on some of the prisoners we’ve brought in has been excellent.”

            “No,” Shio replied firmly, “I’m not torturing kids.”

            “Fine….” Azula said, rolling her eyes, “then help me figure out HOW to break them.”

            “And if I refuse to come with you?”

            “Well…” she said a sadistic smile creeping across her face, “then I guess I’ll just have to be your new sparring partner, and believe me I will not go easy on you this time.”

            He knew from experience that she was not bluffing and he had no doubt that she could defeat him easily and leave him a bloody, burnt mess. Put five well trained swordsman in front of him and he could dispatch them rather easily, but combating benders had always been his weakness; amateurs he could handle but an extremely skilled bender like Azula was trouble.  

            He sighed, scowling, “Fine.” He muttered through clenched teeth, gulping down the last of his milk and rising from the table. They left immediately for the prison.

            “Besides,” she said as they left the palace and started up the road to the prison, “the guards won’t let me be alone with the prisoners and they stop me if I get too rough.” She smirked at him, “I have a feeling you, my potential sparring partner will be a little more lenient on me, right?” she said, letting some fire gather on her fingertips.

            His mouth formed into a grim line as she laughed and walked a little faster. “They’re just children,” he muttered under his breath, wishing to be anywhere but here.

            Azula whirled around, eyes blazing, “What did you say?!” she yelled, getting right in his face.

            Shio took a step back, “I said, they’re just kids, you can’t beat on them like you would a regular prisoner.” He replied folding his arms.

            “Well I have been!” she shouted at him, “and do you know why?”

            He shook his head no, still surprised by her sudden intensity.

            “I’ve been talking to father’s intelligence division these last two days, and we’ve come up with a theory,” she said speaking in a slightly more quiet tone of voice, beginning to pace in front of the swordsman, “and we’ve come up with a theory that since the avatar is only a child, then that means an entire avatar cycle has passed right under our noses!” her voice began to get louder again, “three avatars have lived and died and we knew nothing about it!!”  She whirled on him, “Meaning,” she said stabbing a finger into his chest, “there is some kind of underground organization that has been raising avatars for the last hundred years! Either that, or all of the other avatars died early.” She was silent for a moment, and removed her finger from his chest, he rubbed the spot a little. “Either way,” she growled, resuming pacing, “I’m going to get it out of them if it’s the last thing I do,” She turned glaring at him, “and if you stand against me,” a slight smirk crossed her face, “well, you won’t be standing much longer…” she hadn’t even bothered to veil the threat that time. “Are we clear?” she asked.

            “Crystal.” He replied nodding. Without another word she turned and strode towards the prison, the swordsman trailing in her wake.

            Azula dismissed the guard standing by the door of the prisoner’s cell, took a key from her pocket and opened it. Shio followed Azula into the cell.

            “I brought a friend today,” Azula said to the children, smugness dripping from her voice, “he’s going to help me…”

            Azula began to monologue again, as she tended to do around with people she had absolute power over. Shio once again tuned out the princess and observed the children. Their clothes were essentially in tatters at this point, holes burned and torn in them from Azula’s brutal interrogation. The three had, burns cuts, and bruises covering their bodies; the burns and cuts seemed to have been hastily taken care of if only to prevent infection. They looked incredibly tired. He noted that the avatar had a muzzle of sorts over his mouth; apparently the young boy was apt at bending without the use of his hands.

            Azula finished her monologue and began to go to work on the kids, using her fists, the blue fire she generated and limited use of her ability to generate lightning. Like she had asked he watched the kid’s reactions. He quickly picked up a pattern: if you wanted to get an emotional response from the avatar, hurt the watertribe girl, and if you wanted to get to the girl, hurt the older boy. The older boy with the ponytail was much harder to read. He looked to Shio like he was around his age, maybe 15 years old or so.

            It was quite obvious to the swordsman that Azula had picked up on this pattern as well and was employing it quite effectively against the children although they refused to even divulge a single word. To be completely honest, Shio was impressed with them, he had seen professional soldiers crack under her techniques. The big question was, if she could already figure this out on her own, why did she need him to be there?

            At some point during the interrogation, Azula stopped getting the reaction she wanted from the avatar. She smirked and without taking her eyes off the bald boy, zapped the watertribe girl with a bolt of lightning. The girl writhed in pain but didn’t scream; Shio admired her resilience.

            Azula whirled on the girl and got within centimeters of her face, “Scream for me girl…” she hissed.

            The girl scowled at the princess and spat bloody saliva right in Azula’s face.

            Rage flared on Azula’s face, she slammed the back of her fist into the unfortunate girls face, sending her flying into the right wall of the cell where she slumped against it.

            Azula advanced on the poor girl, a nearly white hot flame blazing on her fist, “You’ll pay…” she growled through gritted teeth. Azula raised her arm, ready to burn a hole straight through the still reeling girl’s chest.

            “NO!!” screamed the boy with the ponytail, straining against the chains that bound him, while the avatar silently strained against his chains, his eyes bugging out of his head.

            Azula brought her arm down, aiming right at the girl’s heart. Without even consciously thinking about it, Shio darted forward and grabbed Azula’s wrist, stopping her fist just short of the girl’s chest, merely singing a new hole in her clothes.

            “Enough.” Shio said calmly, “You’ll kill her.”

            “SO WHAT!?!” Azula screamed whirling on him, “YOU SAW WHAT SHE DID!!”

            “Because,” he continued, his voice still calm, “if you kill her, they will be totally useless to us, the other two won’t give up any information if you kill her. AND, even if we can’t get any information out of them, they can still be used as bargaining chips with those watertribe ships that have been raiding our supplies.”

            Azula scowled at him but he could see the rage leaving her eyes as the logic of his argument penetrated the haze of anger in her mind. “FINE.” she said coldly, ripping her wrist out of the swordsman’s grasp, and stalking out of the cell.

            Shio turned to follow the princess, but turned and looked back at the sad hungry and bloody children. “ _They don’t deserve this,”_ he thought, _“avatar or not.”_ He turned and slammed the door to the cell, following Azula down the hall. He couldn’t free them even if he wanted to but he could secretly make life a little better for them. Later that night, he paid off a guard to bring a small meal to the kids, being the princess’s body guard paid fairly well.

            Azula now insisted that he that he came to all of the torture sessions for the avatar and his friends for the next two days. It became quite clear that she only brought him along to make him squirm as she invented more horrible and painful tortures for the unfortunate prisoners. Both days he took pity on them and had meals sent to them after Azula had left. During the sessions it was clear that the frustrations of not being able to break these incredibly resilient kids; he could see her sanity slowly unraveling. More and more he found himself sympathizing with the prisoners, no one deserved what Azula was doing to them. He found himself questioning his own motives, why did he honestly stay in the firenation? He wasn’t happy, and had no friends other than Azula and their relationship could hardly be described as friendship. He came upon the realization that there was no way to get the kids out of the firenation without Azula hunting them down and killing the four of them. He knew there was only one way out of this but he knew he could never go through with it.

            The next day Azula brought him with her for the fourth time. This time she didn’t even bother asking any questions, as soon as the guards were gone she threw the avatar against the left wall and conjured a massive bolt of lightning and began shocking the two watertribe kids harder than she ever had before with a look of sadistic glee plastered on her face.

            “What are you doing?!?” Shio exclaimed, “You’ll kill them!”

            “That’s the idea!” she crowed gleefully, “My father wants the avatar alive, he doesn’t care what happens to these two and I have no further use for them.”

            Shio shook his head in disgust as the two kids squirmed and cried on the floor of the cell, “I can’t take this anymore,” he said turning, “I’m going back to the palace.”

            “No you’re not.” Azula snapped, “you do not get to walk away when I tell you to be somewhere.”

            “Watch me.” He said walking down the hall. About halfway down the hall he heard the sharp crackle of electricity and the two screamed louder than he had ever heard during the last four days. He stopped dead in his tracks, gritting his teeth.  “Dammit.” He muttered turning back down the hall. He knew he had only one chance at this and he had to make it count. He clenched his fists as he approached the cell door, “Time to stand up for something I believe in.”

            He stood in the doorway behind Azula, “I’m sorry.” He said to the princess who was continuing to shock the two.

            “Your insolence is forgiven,” she said, not even turning to him, “I knew you couldn’t stay away.”

            His hand drifted to the hilt of his broadsword protruding over his right shoulder, he knew as soon as it left its sheath there was no turning back.

            “That’s not what I was apologizing for.” There was a metallic ring as the blade cleared its scabbard and he swung it as hard as he could.   

           


	3. Flight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After incapacitating Princess Azula, a sympathetic Shio tries desperately to get the Gaang out of the Fire Nation capitol

AEWFS Ch 3: Flight

            At the last second Shio had a slight change of heart, he changed the angle of his sword so that the flat of the blade hit Azula and not the razor sharp edge. The force of the blow threw Azula into the right-hand wall of the cell; her head rebounded off the wall, leaving a splotch of blood as she dropped to the floor of the cell, unmoving.

            Shio quickly sheathed his broadsword and ran to the princess’s side and checked her pulse; finding somewhat normal one, he checked her breathing which he found satisfactory. Confident she wasn’t getting up anytime soon, he spun away and turned his attention to the three prisoners, two of which were staring at him in shock.

            The girl was clearly unconscious, slumped against the wall, blood trickling from her nose; the water tribe boy was conscious but completely out of it, he head lolling up and down, mumbling incomprehensibly to himself. The avatar, on the other hand, was livid; he jerked against his chains trying to free himself.

            “Hold on, hold on,” the swordsman muttered going to Azula and rifling through her pockets, “gimme a second.” He finally found the right pocket and retrieved a set of keys. He went to the boy and unlocked the boy’s muzzle.

            “Are they ok?!?” The boy immediately asked as Shio searched for the key to their chains.

            “Just give me a second kid; I can only do one thing at a time. Ah, there we go…” he finally got the right key and undid his chains.

            The avatar immediately rushed to the girl’s side, the swordsman trailing right behind him. Shio quickly checked her pulse and breathing as the Airbender wrung his hands and fretted; she was definitely alive, judging by the trauma she would be unconscious for a while.

            “She’s alive,” He told the airbender, “but she’s badly hurt.”

            A look of worry passed over the young boy’s face.

            “She’ll be fine if we can get out of here as soon as we possibly can.” He rose and went to the boy with the ponytail who was still completely out of it. “Hey,” he said snapping his fingers loudly in front of the boy’s face, but got no response. He repeated himself but still got no response as the boy continued to mutter to himself, his eyes unfocused. They needed to get out of there as soon as they could so Shio resorted to desperate measures; he slapped the boy across the face and he came to with a start.

            “Huh? Wha-? What’s going on? Where’s the psycho princess?” the boy spat out in one long string.

            “We’re getting out of here and she’s in the corner.” Shio replied shortly.

            The boy looked confused, opened his mouth then closed it again, seemingly having decided not to question why this stranger was helping them, “Ok,” he said, “where are we going?”

            “Here’s the plan,” Shio said, “first, we’re goi-”

            There was a sharp intake of breath from the cell door, “What’s going on here?!?” the guard asked loudly, apparently investigating the fact that there were no sounds of torture, “What have you done to the prin- ughgch…..” the guard’s sentence was cut off with a gurgle, as Shio had just put a sword through the man’s esophagus. The man gurgled for a few moments, blood frothing at his lips and then was still.

            “Anyway,” Shio said, removing the sword and letting the unfortunate guard’s corpse fall to the ground; he didn’t want to kill, but if they wanted to get out of the prison, much less the capitol, there could be no witnesses, “I’m going to get you out of here, first we nee-”

            “Hold up a second.” The boy with the ponytail said abruptly, cutting Shio off, “What’s the catch? People like you don’t do things for free…” he folded his arms and frowned slightly at the swordsman.

            Shio gave a small smirk, “Smart boy, I have one condition: you take me with you. I have no life here anymore. I want out.”

            The boy in blue thought about it for a moment, then nodded and opened his mouth but was cut off by Aang, “No! You just killed that guy! I’m not going with some-”

            “Hahaha! He’s just kidding,” Sokka said slapping his hand over the avatar’s mouth, “you’re the only way we’re ever getting out of here.”

            Shio nodded, “Ok, here’s the plan: your bison is chained up outside in the courtyard entrance and your stuff is in the lockup on the bottom floor; all we have to do is grab your stuff, avoid all of the guards and fly out of here.”

            “Why do I have the feeling that it’s not going to be that easy?” sighed the Water Tribe boy.

            The swordsman smirked at him, “Come on, being a pessimist is my job; besides, now that Prince Zuko is back, they diverted a lot of guards to the place to guard him so opposition will be little if any. I’ll also need to get some belongings from the palace, but you only have to drop me off and pick me back up, so there’s very little risk.”

            They nodded reluctantly and the water tribe boy picked up the still unconscious girl and carried her piggyback. Shio drew his short swords and they quickly made their way towards the stairs, Shio could feel the young Airbender staring daggers at him the whole way down the stairs.

            Surprisingly, they encountered no resistance going down to the first floor. As they approached the lockup, Shio spotted a single guard at the door; he strode confidently down the hall even as he felt the kids drop back warily.

            The guard quickly noticed Shio striding towards him and the younger children hiding near the end of the hallway, he pivoted almost into a fighting stance, “What are the prisoners doing out of their-”

            He didn’t even gurgle as Shio strode up and cut him down with a single slash across the throat.

            “Why are you just killing them?!?” the young Airbender loudly asked, aghast and disgusted at the older boy.

            Shio looked at him sternly, “The fewer people know you’re out of your cell, the more time we’ll have before we’ll have to deal with a crap-ton of guards. Now stop arguing with me and grab your stuff.”

            The avatar glared at him but went inside and began gathering their bags as the other three stayed outside. After a few minutes they were back on their way. They quickly made their way to the front gate where Shio called them to a halt.

            He studied the courtyard, noting the positions of all of the guards who had thankfully not spotted them yet. “Ok let’s go, if they challenge us, I’ll see if I can’t talk us out of here. If it gets nasty, you run back here, shut and bar the inner and outer gates while I deal with the guards.”

            “How are you going to deal with them?!?” the boy with the ponytail asked, waving his arms dramatically, “There’s like 50 of them out there!”

            Shio rolled his eyes behind his glasses, “There’s six of them, and trust me, I can handle them.” And without another word, he strode out, the younger kids trailing behind.

            It wasn’t long before a guard called out for them to halt. “Where do you think you’re going?” the guard asked approaching with two of his fellows and stood blocking their way to the chained up bison who’s ears perked up at the voices.

            “Ozai has ordered the prisoners to be brought to the palace, princess Azula is dealing with the paperwork.”

            The guard looked at him skeptically, and opened his mouth and then glanced up as an alarm bell started ringing from inside the prison.

            Shio’s shoulders slumped, and he sighed “Of course they would find her now…” he muttered to himself.

            “Yeah, I don’t think so,” the guard said drawing his sword and motioning to the other three guards, “We’re taking you guys in.”

            Shio glanced behind him and saw the kids running for the doors leading back into the palace. He began to backpedal as the guards advanced on them. “Come on guys,” He said holding his hands out to either side, “Let’s be reasonable here, let us go and no one gets hurt.”

            The guard snorted, “There’s six of us and one of you, what chance do you think you’ll have?”

            “One last chance guys,” Shio said, his hands slowly drifting towards the hilts of his short swords, “just walk away.” He heard the gate clang shut behind him and he stopped, they were in the middle of the courtyard and seeing that they couldn’t get to the children with him there, the  six guards formed a ring around Shio.

            Shio, knowing they wouldn’t back down, Shio quickly assessed his opponents, the six men were all fairly new guards, he knew this because he had trained them two weeks earlier. Three of them wielded swords and the other three were fire benders, which worried him somewhat. The swordsmen he knew he could take on rather easily, but benders had always been a weakness of his; he was a close quarters combatant while most benders tended to fight from longer distances.

            The head guard smirked rushed at the sixteen year old swordsman. Shio quickly shed his coat and broadsword, unsheathing his two short swords as he did so and tossing them in the air; the coat fell to the ground with a thud and he caught his two swords just in time to block the guard’s attack.

            Shio smirked to himself, _that was totally unnecessary on my part,_ he thought, _but it rattled the guards so it was worth it._

            All three of the swordsman engaged him at once, it was all he could do just to block and dodge all of the swipes and blows they were aiming at him. Meanwhile, circling around the edges, the three firebenders were firing jets of flame at him, preventing him from mounting an effective offensive against the other three.

            As he was dodging yet another blast of fire and parried another blow from a sword, one of the other swordsmen got behind him and managed to inflict a shallow gash across his back. _Damn!_ He cursed to himself, _I need to deal with them or I’m going to get killed; and if I die these kids don’t stand a chance._

            He quickly swiped one of his swords along the ground throwing dirt and rocks into the faces of the swordsman; while they tried to get the dust out of their eyes he broke away and launched himself at the nearest firebender. The man didn’t even have time to react as he shoved a sword between his ribs and through his heart. Pausing only to pull the sword out, he quickly ran at the next one; in his peripherals he could see the three swordsmen regaining their composure and were trying to locate him. The second and third firebenders began to pelt him with blasts of fire as he advanced on them. He deftly spun and dodged, he managed to avoid all but one which caught him in his left shoulder, leaving a singed second degree burn but he ignored the pain, getting in close to the two benders. He battered through their weak close quarter defenses, first slashing the throat of one, then sliding between the other man’s legs, slashing a major artery near his groin as he went through leaving him to bleed out in the dirt.

            By this time the three swordsmen were hot on his tail and they were angry, having just watched as he cut down their friends in a matter of thirty seconds. Shio whirled around just as the first swordsman made it to him; he quickly planted a strong front kick right in the man’s chest, sending him flying backwards as the other two engaged him.

            With no distractions he was able to quickly overpower the two and killed them with little effort. The last man stood from the ground, fear in his eyes but rushed at the red clad teenager anyway. Shio sighed and spun out of the way slashing the back of the man’s neck as his momentum carried him past, cutting into his spine and severing his spinal cord, the last guard dropped like a ton of bricks.

            The swordsman stood for a second, catching his breath; he could feel warm blood seeping slowly down his back from the slash between his shoulder blades and the blowing wind stung the burn on his left shoulder. He heard the gate clank open and the kids emerged and began running towards the bison. He picked a ring of keys off of one of the guards and tossed them to the Airbender so he could undo the beast’s chains. Still breathing heavily, he gingerly put on his sleeveless coat and broadsword, trying not to brush again either wound. He sheathed his two short swords and went to help them load their luggage.

            “Holy crap,” the swordsman said eyeing the great beast as he handed bags up to the avatar, “I didn’t think they were so big, I’ve only ever seen pictures of them in textbooks.”

            The avatar merely grunted, deliberately ignoring the swordsman. He jumped down off the saddle and grabbed the still unconscious girl and lay her down in the saddle. They all climbed into the saddle and with a “Yip yip!” from the Avatar, they were off.

            They flew towards the palace at Shio’s direction. As they approached the walls surrounding the palace, Shio ducked down over the lip of the saddle so as not to be spotted. “Alright guys,” the swordsman said to the two, “My window is right there, drop me off and hide for five minutes then come back and pick me up.”

            The watertribe boy nodded as the massive beast pulled up beside the window; Shio quickly clambered through the window as the guards on the wall began blowing the warning horns and bells.

            He quickly began to pack a large bag; he grabbed some clothes, his spare set of short swords, his extra set of sunglasses, throwing stars, small explosives and every single other small weapon could fit.

            As he was shoving several small knives into the bag, the door to his room burst open revealing prince Zuko with a smug grin on his face. “And where do you think you’re going?” the prince asked, his voice dripping with superiority.

            “None of your business.” Shio said, closing the bag up.

            “Where’s my sister?”

            “I don’t keep track of her.” Shio knew he had to stall for time; he had only been there for three minutes.

            “That’s your job, you moron.” The prince scoffed, “besides there are multiple witnesses that saw you leave with her for the prison; suddenly the prisoners escaped and you’re here and Azula is nowhere to be found…I figured I’d find you here…” he let the sentence trail off.

            “What exactly are you implying?” Shio said dropping the bag on the ground and puffing himself up, trying to look bigger than he really was.

            “That you’re a traitor.” Zuko spat at him.

            Shio grabbed the hilts of his short swords, “Ok look,” he said cracking his neck, “let’s stop beating around the bush, and if we’re going to do this then let’s do this.”

            Shio drew the swords and saw fear flash in the prince’s eyes, he thought the firebender was about to attack him but instead he whistled, and ten royal guards poured through the door.

            There was no possible way to win this fight; making a split second decision, Shio scooped up his bag and sheathed his swords and quickly ran for the window. He had lost track of time, he didn’t know if they were there or not but this was the only way there was even a chance of making it out of this alive.

            He tensed and threw himself out the open window, seeing no massive bison waiting for him. Silently cursing he fished in his coat pocket and pulled out a small explosive; if he was going to go out, he was going to go out with a literal bang. He pulled the cap off the top, the built in mechanism lighting the fuse, and threw it through the window to his room. He closed his eyes, and braced for the inevitable impact.

            He hit a lot sooner than he had expected, as the air was driven out of his lungs, his eyes snapped open and he found himself hovering two stories under his window having hit the bison’s saddle. He gasped for air, trying to yell at the Airbender.

“G-g-g-GO!” he managed to choke out between gasps of air, “NOW!!”

No sooner had the words left his mouth when the explosive detonated, blowing chunks of stone and wood out of the wall. It rained down, straight through the area where the bison had just been.

They soared away from the palace, catapults launching flaming boulders at them. Shio breathed a sigh of relief; they were out of danger for the most part. Suddenly, the great beast gave a bellow and flicked his massive tail, sending a red clad body flying through the air and  crash landing in the saddle.

Prince Zuko, who must have jumped and clung to the beast’s tail as they flew away from the window, sprang to his feet in a firebending stance. The weak and injured children huddled close to the front of the saddle, the two boys using their bodies to shield the still unconscious girl from any attack that might come; Shio scowled and slowly rose to his feet.

“As I said,” the prince hissed, steam coming out of his nostrils, “You’re not going anywhere.”

The two fire nation teenagers stood mere feet apart on the small saddle, both breathing heavy.

“Do you really want to fight me this close?” Shio growled, putting on his most intimidating voice, attempting to unnerve the cocky prince, he slowly drew one short sword from its sheath, “I’ve killed a lot of people to get these kids out of here, I will not hesitate to do the same to you if you try to stop us now. I have nothing to lose anymore.”

            Rage covered Zuko’s face for a moment then he relaxed slightly. He scowled at the swordsman, eyeing the blade of his short sword which Shio knew was caked with the drying blood of the guards.

            “Here’s the deal.” Shio said lowering his sword slightly, “You have two choices, one: we drop altitude and you can jump into the harbor, and that’s the end of it, you swim to shore and we go on our merry way; or two: you try your luck and fight me, and we’ll dump your corpse in the ocean instead.”

            The prince looked down, thinking for a moment, then slowly lowered his hands to his sides, his face still seething with anger.

            “Good choice.” Shio said as he darted forward and shoved Zuko over the side of the saddle. They had just passed the docks and were low over the shallow water. The prince hit the water with a massive splash; Shio continued watching until he saw Zuko bob to the surface, treading water and screaming unintelligible obscenities at them.

            Shio breathed a sigh of relief and then slumped against the side of the saddle, exhausted from the ordeal they had just been through.

 


	4. Chapter 4: Common Enemy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this a long time ago, not sure why i never posted this chapter here. I'll eventually come back to this story, as soon as I'm done writing my Futurama Fic

AEWFS Ch 4

Common Enemy

            Prince Zuko’s curses faded into the distance as they cleared the gates of Azulon; the trio breathed a sigh of relief and slumped down against the side of the saddle. Grimacing in pain from the deep slash between his shoulder blades, Shio shrugged his overloaded bag off and slowly made his way over to the still unconscious girl, rather worried that she still had yet to regain consciousness.  He examined the girl briefly, her arms, legs and torso did not seem to have any significant injuries other than the burns, cuts and bruises.

            He then examined her head; he found a large patch of hair at the back of her head, matted with blood. She must have smashed it into the wall of the cell when being shocked by Azula. Odds are she had a massive concussion and needed help very soon.   

            “She’ll…be…Fine…” he lied between gasps of air, their escape leaving the three of them winded; he didn’t want to worry them so he hid the true severity of the girl’s condition. He saw a look of relief pass over the young avatar’s face; the boy came over and sat down next to the girl.

            Shio returned to his previous position “You know,” he said, “I don’t know any of your names.” An uncomfortable silence followed, “Uh, I guess I’ll start, I’m Shio.”

            The avatar continued to pointedly ignore Shio’s attempt at conversation. The water tribe boy glared slightly at the young Airbender and rolled his eyes, “I’m Sokka,” he said turning to the swordsman, “This is my sister Katara and…” He paused turning his head towards the pouting Airbender, “THE ONE BEING A TOTAL JERK” he yelled animatedly, “Is Aang.” He finished calmly turning back to Shio.

            Shio allowed himself a small smile; he nodded at his travelling companions, “Glad to meet all of you. He said simply. He leaned back against the lip of the saddle but suddenly sat up and doubled over in pain. He had leaned back on the deep slash right between his shoulder blades inflicted by the guards during their escape from the prison.   

            He gasped and shuddered, the adrenaline rush of the last half-hour wearing off; he just now realized how much he was hurting. His back throbbed sharply and he could feel the warmth of fresh blood flowing from the wound, the steady wind from their flight stung his severely burnt shoulder.

            “Oh man,” He heard Sokka mutter; now getting a clear view of his back, “You’re bleeding straight through your jacket!”

             _That can’t be good,_ Shio thought,  _That jacket isn’t thin, must be soaked…_

            He attempted to sit up, but instantly became lightheaded and sank back down into his hunched pose.

            “Here let me help,” Sokka said helping him to lie down on his stomach and remove the red black and yellow jacket, a large, dark crimson stain now marring the back of it.

            He heard Sokka inhale sharply as the damage to his back became evident. “We have to stop the bleeding,” he said, “I have to get your shirt off.”

            Shio nodded in agreement and felt cold steel touch his skin and heard ripping as Sokka used his razor sharp boomerang, retrieved from their belongings, to slice off the swordsman’s black shirt. He then the remains of it into long strips and used them as makeshift bandages to tightly wrap the deep cut.

            Shio gasped in pain as the water tribe boy put hard pressure on the profusely bleeding gash.         

            Aang angrily muttered something about how Shio didn’t stop the soldier’s bleeding back at the prison.

            Sokka angrily glared at him, “He saved our lives Aang,” he said his voice tight with exasperation, “The least we can do is make sure that he doesn’t die as well.”

            The avatar rolled his eyes and turned away, heading up to the bison’s head.

            Shio took in the state of all of them. While he had two significant injuries to worry about, the three friends were covered with small burns cuts and other injuries all of which had a good chance of becoming infected.

            “All of us need a doctor,” he said to the others, “as soon as we possibly can.”

            “How?” asked Sokka, “we’re fugitives! Who would treat us?”

            “No one…” Shio murmured to himself, slowly shaking his head; then he cocked his head to the side a memory suddenly occurring to him. He briefly rummaged through his bag and came out with a map. He used his fingertip, dipped in a trickle of blood running down his ribs to circle a small fire nation town on the map. “Go here.” He said handing the map to the avatar, “there’s a chance we can get some help there.”

            “Why should I believe anything you say?” the avatar asked turning to face them glaring angrily.

            “Because,” Shio growled, glaring right back at the small monk, “If we don’t get help, then she may die, or have permanent brain damage.”

            The avatar’s face softened, he looked at the unconscious girl, she wasn’t looking very good, her face noticeably paler than before.    

            “So,” Shio continued, his voice kinder and less harsh, “you can ignore me if you want, but we’ll all die from infection. If we go there, we have a chance of all of us walking away from this alive.

            Aang frowned for a moment then frusturatedly snatched the map from the swordsman and turned the bison in the proper direction.

            After a few minutes of silence, Sokka released the pressure from Shio’s back, “Bleeding has stopped for now.” Then let out a huge yawn, “Man I’m tired.”

            “Get some sleep.” Shio said, “It’ll be a few hours before we get there and you guys have all been through a lot.

            Sokka nodded and lay down and was almost instantly snoring quietly. Shio’s eyes slowly drifted shut, plunging him into blissful unawareness of the pain in his body.

            Shio woke to the soft thud as the massive flying beast touched down in a clearing on the outskirts of the small village. The bison gently lay down, trying to not disturb the occupants of his saddle.

            Shio looked around and saw Sokka sprawled across the back of the saddle and Aang sleeping in the fetal position next to a still unconscious Katara. The girl looked almost grey at this point; she needed medical attention as soon as possible.

            Knowing how risky this undertaking was, he decided to go by himself to see the person that may or may not help them. He slowly and quietly eased himself up into a sitting position, trying unsuccessfully to not reopen the wound on his back; as he sat up, he felt the scab rip open and felt warm, fresh blood began to flow freely from the wound.

            Feeling lightheaded from blood loss, he used his broadsword and its sheath to support himself as he walked.

            As he walked by its head, the bison gave a concerned huff. “Don’t worry,” Shio said, “I’ll probably be fine.If I’m not back by sundown, get them someplace safe.” The bison gave another huff which seemed to indicate that it understood.

            He slowly made his way into the woods, leaving the still sleeping children behind as he made tracks for the small cottage he knew would be there.

            He walked for what seemed like hours, in his weakened and somewhat delirious state, time didn’t have much meaning. He could feel that the blood had soaked through the makeshift bandage and was running down his back and soaking into the back of his pants.

            Eventually he saw the building he was looking for through a break in the trees, a field of fire lilies in the distance. Using some of the last of his strength he made his way to the door and banged weakly on the door, leaning heavily on his sword.

            After a few moments an old woman wearing fire nation clothes answered the door, “Yes, can I help-”she stopped mid-sentence; she took in the boy’s condition and her eyes widened.

            “Help…me…” Shio managed to say before his knees buckled and he fell forward. The old woman caught him as he fell, his sword clattering to the floor in the doorway. She carried him to the kitchen table and with some effort hauled him onto it and immediately removed the soaked through bandages.

            He was completely out of it from pain and blood loss but his addled mind did made a vague note of her long nails and her odd skin tone for a citizen of the fire nation; he knew he had come to the right place.

            She left for a few moments and quickly returned with a large amount of bandages and put pressure on the wound.

    After several minutes the bleeding was under control and Shio felt slightly more lucid now that he was lying down.

    “I’m afraid there’s not much I can do for you, I’m only an innkeeper.” The old lady said turning to the door, “I’ll go get the town doctor.”

    The injured boy’s hand shot out, grabbing her wrist before she could get very far, “Wait…” he rasped maintaining an iron grip, “I came to you for… a reason. I know who you are… Hamma…”

    She ripped her wrist out of his grip, quickly whipping water out of the kitchen sink and adopting an aggressive stance, the water whirling around her menacingly.

    “How?” her question was growled, a deadly threat implied if she didn’t get an answer she liked.

    “Did you honestly think that Fire Nation spies wouldn’t notice that citizens were going missing once a month? They traced your history all the way back to the Southern Water Tribe. ”

    “So why haven’t they done anything about it then?”

    “Because, the fire nation is stretched thin enough as it is. They don’t have the troops to deal with you and you’re not hurting the war effort; essentially they don’t care enough to deal with you.”

    “What’s stopping me from killing you right now?” she asked, seemingly less angry than before.

    “Well my friends are waiting nearby, they don’t know anything about you but they’re bound to come looking for me eventually. Oh,” he fished around in his pants pocket, “and also this grenade.” He wrapped a finger around the pin. “If you attack me, I pull the pin, the mechanism lights the fuse and your inn gets blown to smithereens.”

    She glared at him before for a moment before returning the water to the sink and pulling up a chair. She sat down and regarded the teenager, still flat on his stomach. “So, if you’re not here to arrest me, then you must want something from me.” she stated.

    He nodded, “I have a proposition for you. My friends and I are badly hurt and we’re fugitives from the capitol; we need to be healed and I understand that skilled water benders such as you can heal people.” She nodded in confirmation, “Good,” He dug in his other pocket, “This is literally all the money I have,” he said jingling the bag of gold coins, “I am prepared to give you all of it if you help us; Half now to heal my back, half later when you heal my companions once I retrieve them.”

    She considered him carefully, “On the run from the Fire Nation you say? Well I’m no friend of the Fire Nation, I’ll help you. I assume that the money is to not ask any questions and not tell anyone you were here?”

    He nodded, plunking half the coins on the table.

    She immediately went to work on his back and badly burned shoulder. He couldn’t see what she was doing, but felt a cool sensation seep into the wounds washing away any pain, it was certainly weird when he felt his flesh begin to knit back together but the itching sensation soon passed. When she was finished, he examined his shoulder, showing no sign of burn damage but was bright pink with new flesh which she explained would adopt normal coloring over time. Apparently her healing had produced new blood because he didn’t feel dizzy when he stood up anymore. He examined his back in a mirror revealing a jagged pink scar right between his shoulder blades.

    He frowned, “Will it go away?”

    She shook her head, “I can’t say for sure, but probably not, that was a large wound, and you’re lucky that I was able to heal it as much as I did.”

    He nodded, sighing slightly, “Well, I’ll go and get my friends.” He said picking up his broadsword and walking towards the door.

    “Wait.” She said stopping him as he was about to reach the door. She told him that she would only agree to heal them if they were blindfolded, it was bad enough that he knew where she lived, she didn’t need more people knowing her secret.

    “Fair enough.” He acquiesced, opening the door and heading back towards the bison, moving at a much faster pace than the trip to her house.

    He arrived back to find the kids awake but looking rather weak. “I’ve found a healer,” he said not even greeting them, “She has a technique that heals you incredibly quickly.” He spun around showing off the jagged scar on his back; it was certainly ugly but it was better than bleeding to death.

    Aang glared at Shio mistrustfully and opened his mouth to argue when he glanced at Katara, who looked even worse than when Shio left, sweat now beading on her forehead. The avatar’s mouth formed into a grim line; he scooped the girl up and jumped off, stumbling a little bit on the landing almost dropping the girl.

    “Why don’t you let me take her?” Sokka offered, “You don’t look so good.”

    Aang nodded, handing Katara off to the older boy.

    Shio explained that she would only treat them if they were blindfolded to which they reluctantly agreed.

    He led them to Hamma’s inn and she went straight to work on them. Aang and Sokka were easy fixes, they had many bruises and cuts and burns but nothing life threatening. She spent a much longer time on Katara, focusing mainly on her head. After a while she used the water to do something to her brain, and woke her up briefly, asking her a few basic questions to make sure there was no brain damage before easing her back into unconscious.

    “She’s going to be fine. Just let her rest for as long as she needs to. You all need to rest,” she said in a stern motherly fashion.

    Shio nodded, “We’re all going to get plenty of rest. We all have some downtime coming after the last few days.”

    After a few thank-yous Shio began to usher the three out the door, the new peacefully sleeping Katara once again cradled in Aang’s arms. Shio looked back at the older woman. He politely nodded to her and she nodded back, a silent agreement passing between them that neither had ever met the other. He tossed her the remainder of his coins, turned and walked out the door without another word, leading the other three back to the bison.  


End file.
